[StrongED] StrongED 4.70a5 available

[Fred Graute <fjgraute@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi All,

The fifth alpha release of StrongED 4.70 can found on the website:
http://www.stronged.iconbar.com/archives/releases/se470a5.zip

The changes in this version are mostly in two areas; configuration and
internal organisation.


Save box
========

The most visible change is arguably the new layout of the Save box. It
has been redesigned to make it more clear that there are menus attached
to the filename and filetype fields. The icons for Selection and ASCII
are now shaded rather than hidden when not available, and their labels
are more descriptive.

Using Ctrl-V to paste into the Save box while StrongED itself holds the
clipboard should now work but could do with more testing so please give
it a workout to see if it holds up.


Mode Choices
============

The mode permissions that are in the ModeLock file can now be set from
the Mode Choices -> Misc section. Hopefully this will make them more
visible and accessible.

These new options made it necessary to reorganise the layout of the Misc
section. The default line end is now a string set (in toolbox parlour),
and the spell check options are a lot less verbose (they may be moved to
another section later on). The default filetype has gained a filetype
menu from which the filetype can be selected.

The Toolbars section also uses string sets now. There's a lot of room
left in this section, if anyone has any suggestions what it could be
used for please let me know. I haven't been able to come up with
something that fits in with Toolbars and renaming the section to Misc2,
or similar, doesn't look right IMO.


Ctrls and Tabs
==============

There have been some further tweaks to how Ctrls and Tabs are displayed.
Ctrls can now also be shown as dots, as already possible in Dump mode.
The option 'Show Ctrl as [hex]' has been turned into another string set.

The option 'Special Ctrls' no longer controls display of Tabs. For this
there's a new option 'Special Tabs', also in the Font section. This
allows special chars for Ctrls and Tabs to be configured independently.

The option 'Use 8*8 in hires' has been removed. Size of system font is
now done from the menu attached to the system font setting.


New functions
=============

There are several new functions: SetCounter, PushBlock and PullBlock.
See below for more details. PushBlock and PullBlock are experimental,
they seem to work (on normal blocks only) but need a lot more testing.


Interactive help
================

The interactive help and manual have been updated for all the above
changes but I'm sure there's room for improvement, any suggestions
towards that will be most welcome.


Internal changes
================

There are quite a few internal changes in this version that may cause
problems such as renaming variables and storing of internal flags. I've
been quite meticulous in updating all relevant code but it's possible
some bits were missed. If you spot _anything_ odd please let me know.


As always, all feedback is welcome and appreciated!

Cheers,
Fred.


Changes in StrongED 4.70a5 (from 4.70a4)
========================================

  - Fix Print dbox, it was marked as a pane and could not be moved.

  - Fix a bug when flash caret was being turned off. If the caret was in
    the off state then it would remain off.

  - Fix redraw of filetype icon in SaveBox. Use Wimp_ForceRedraw rather
    than Wimp_SetIconState which doesn't clear the area to redraw.

  - Fixed the problem of trying to paste the clipboard content into a
    save box when StrongED holds the clipboard itself.

  - Fix a bug when flash caret was being turned off. If the caret was in
    the off state then it would remain off.

  - Fix a bug in LoF for a module. If the module had SWIs and the SWI
    table didn't pad with a branch then clicking on the last SWI name
    would cause an abort.

  - Fix view sometimes moving to bottom of window stack when turning off
    Toolbar or Infobar.

  - Fix bug with LoFs that had 'Mark text' turned on. The addition of
    permissions to Mode Choices caused this to surface.

  - Changed generation of grab menus for modules (-workspace). It will
    now append a module's instantiation postfix. Also fixed a minor
    bug, r7 got corrupted.

  - Refactored code that plots the cursors. Now there's only one routine
    doing the actual plotting. Increased height of underscore cursor
    slightly. It's now a small rectangle instead of a single line. Looks
    better IMO.

  - Further work on plotting of cursors. Width of block and underscore
    caret is now set to width of widest char. Works better with bitmap
    fonts that have a width > 8, but worse with outline fonts as widest
    char is often much larger than narrowest char.

  - Changed design of savebox. Added menu buttons for the path and type
    fields, so it's clear there are menus. The Selection and ASCII
    buttons are now always visible, shaded if not available/active.

  - Moved code for handling keypresses to its own source file 'KeyPress'
    (ready for changes, DeepKeys?).

  - Made Fastchar RPC compatible again, the code was still using LDRH
    to load character data for fonts with widths between 9 - 16.

  - Refactored Message_DataLoad so it's more readable and a bit
    shorter. Glad it's done now, been wanting to do this for a long
    time.

  - Split text flags in two as there were no more free bits. Now we have
    internal flags (those that keep state) and external flags (those that
    can be configured). Updated all relating code accordingly.

  - New function: SetCounter. Allows the replace counter to be set up in
    a ModeFile so it can be used in a subsequent Replace().

  - New functions: PushBlock and PullBlock. They allow the current block
    to be saved and restored. Useful for functions that select some text
    in order to modify it. Previously this would deselect the already
    selected text, now an existing block can be preserved.

--
To unsubscribe send a mail to StrongED+unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
List archives at http://www.Torrens.org.uk/RO/StrongED/index.html